His bones decay a bit more each day, as he gazes from his bed at the river and the people of the little village doomed by progress. He issues no directives, delivers no speeches and plans no protests. He cannot sit up and can barely walk, the legacy of an incurable, degenerative bone disease that already has claimed six of his vertebrae. And yet, simply by lying still on the dusty banks of the threatened Narmada River, in the heart of a village that is to be drowned by one of the world's largest dam projects, the 76-year-old Baba Amte has quietly become a worldwide living symbol of protest for conservationists and environmentalists.

His bones decay a bit more each day, as he gazes from his bed at the river and the people of the little village doomed by progress. He issues no directives, delivers no speeches and plans no protests. He cannot sit up and can barely walk, the legacy of an incurable, degenerative bone disease that already has claimed six of his vertebrae. And yet, simply by lying still on the dusty banks of the threatened Narmada River, in the heart of a village that is to be drowned by one of the world's largest dam projects, the 76-year-old Baba Amte has quietly become a worldwide living symbol of protest for conservationists and environmentalists.

Pope John Paul II restated Roman Catholic doctrine on birth control and abortion here Sunday, firmly putting to rest fears among some of his more devout followers that he would soft-pedal the issue, a sensitive one in overpopulated India, where the government promotes family planning but where more Catholics than Hindus reportedly practice birth control. Before the Pope left Rome on Jan.